LOS AN­GE­LES

(Long Beach and San Pe­dro)

Of course by de­fault, Los An­ge­les’ close prox­im­ity to Hol­ly­wood makes it the cin­e­matic mecca on the list, and both the ports of Long Beach and San Pe­dro con­ve­niently serve round-trip cruises as well as day vis­its to repo­si­tion­ing ships. Here’s where vis­i­tors will find all the ma­jor stu­dios, many of which are ac­ces­si­ble to the pub­lic for tours. While Univer­sal Stu­dios is fun, it’s pri­mar­ily a theme park. The best way to truly see be­hind-the-scenes is to take ad­van­tage of its VIP Ex­pe­ri­ence and walk around the famed back­lot.

For those not in the know, Univer­sal is where they’ve filmed the likes of Back to the Fu­ture, In­di­ana Jones and the King­dom of the Crys­tal Skull,

Juras­sic Park, the Pi­rates of the Caribbean fran­chise, and more.

A fully au­then­tic stand­alone ex­pe­ri­ence is avail­able with the Warner Bros. Stu­dio Tour, avail­able as a two-hour over­view or five-hour ex­ten­sive look at its back­lot, sound­stages, prop and cos­tume de­part­ments, and post-pro­duc­tion fa­cil­i­ties. At nearly $300 a head, it’s a bit pricey, but it’s se­ri­ously worth it for cinephiles.

Af­ter all, Warner Bros. is where they filmed the clas­sic Casablanca and re­cent La La Land, as well as many cur­rent TV shows like The Big Bang The­ory and The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Tick­ets to tap­ings of these are even avail­able. While not the most pleas­ant of cruise ship movies, the dis­as­ter re­make Pose

idon was pro­duced here, too. Out­side of these stu­dios, other tours are of­fered by Para­mount Pic­tures and Sony Pic­tures. Para­mount is a must for fans of Star Trek, and Sony is great for Jeop­ardy! quiz afi­ciona­dos. Other hon­or­able men­tions a bit out­side Hol­ly­wood proper are the dusty Para­mount Ranch and Melody Ranch, both seen in the new West­world.

If you don’t want to go quite so far, Car­ni­val Cruise Line’s re­cently ex­panded Long Beach ter­mi­nal also has a cin­e­matic his­tory. The ge­o­desic dome that once housed Howard Hughes’ Spruce Goose air­craft is so large that it served as a sound­stage prior to be­com­ing a cruise port. Pro­duc­tions filmed in­side in­clude A.I. Ar­ti­fi­cial In­tel­li­gence, Bat­man & Robin, and Star­gate.

Per­ma­nently moored just next door is the orig­i­nal Queen Mary, it­self a film­ing lo­ca­tion avail­able for tour­ing. The hi­lar­i­ous cruise film Out to Sea may have sup­pos­edly taken place en­tirely on Hol­land Amer­ica Line’s ear­lier Wes­ter­dam, but the Cu­narder dou­bled for some of the ship’s in­te­ri­ors. It can sim­i­larly be seen in The Avi­a­tor, Pearl Har­bor, and The Po­sei­don Ad­ven­ture.